I count calories not carbs. I think counting either is helpful to show you what your actually eating.
I’ve been thinking about caloric count vs restricting carbs. I think you’re right that any one macro (carb, fat, protein) doesn’t need to be eliminated but rather simply count all input vs output.
So… I’ve recalculated my goal (again). I landed at ~205 lbs and stayed there for quite a while. However, I’ve now decided that I want to recompose my body fat to lean mass ratio. I calculated my BMR and TDEE subtracting the 250-500 calories for additional wt loss while focusing on protein intake so I won’t loose muscle. Basically, I want to loose the ‘love handles’ and improve my appearance.
To help focus on muscle, I’m not going to lift weights or anything because I am not interested in spending hours in a gym. Instead I’ll use my body weight to perform resistance exercises (calisthenics). I had a hernia repaired a while back so I had to lay off my pushups. Now, I’ve begun pushups every other day again along with various other exercises. In the Army we called it “the daily dozen“.
This leads me to calorie count of beer. I’ve decided to cut back from 1-2 daily low- carb (calorie) beers (14 beers per week) to 2-3 session-ish beers weekends only (up to 6 beers per week). This means I wouldn’t brew as much using 4-4.5 gal batches. I don’t want to limit my brewing hobby so I’ve decided to cut to 3 gal batches in order to keep the brewdays up while consuming less. The club brews these ‘challenge beers’ a few times a year that I really don’t want a large volume of, so I am going to brew those at 1 gal batches.
I am on the "don't be such a pig" diet
This^^ is basically what I’ve settled on. Being intentional by keeping track of intake and monitoring results.
I’ve been doing this new approach a bit over 30 days now and I’ve seen positive results on the scale and in the mirror. I look forward to those weekend beers and I’ve found they taste even better now.